This summer has been a busy one to say the least! I’ve obviously been failing hard in the world of blogging. I shall redeem myself…I shall, I shall. This blog post is basically summarizing what has been a whirl wind of a summer. In just one very short week, Dusty will be back to the grind, entering his second year of Medical School. Hallelujah! One year down and only….a lot more to go. When second year is over we will be moving again. Dun Dun Dun….the rental house search will be on…and I will be a nervous train wreck. The great thing is we will be moving back to Northern Michigan where we had been living prior to him starting Medical School. We will live in Northern Michigan for two years while he does his clinical years and then it is off in to the wild blue yonder for residency, unless he decides to do his residency there…but we are trying not to get too far ahead of ourselves.

We knew this summer would be a quick one and a special one. This will be the last real summer Dusty gets off in his career. After this he will have rotations and other studying during the summer months with little to no break…so we are trying to soak up every ounce we possibly can before it is over.

The month of July was spent on Lake Medora with my parents and seeing family and friends, we visited Duluth, MN for a week to see Dusty’s family and he took time to help coach a hockey team during the tournament his parents are part of, I attended my 10 year high school reunion (granny over here), and then Dusty and I celebrated our 4th wedding anniversary on July 30. Now we are back at home and he is preparing for summer to end and school to start. Our hope is to rent a place for a weekend during Labor Day weekend with some school friends so I’ve been frantically searching AirBnB like a crazy woman and I am not having much luck considering there are two fur babies involved (aka Reo and Gus) and people just don’t want fur babies messing up their luxurious humble abodes on Lake Michigan.

Side Note: I am feeling a little sad right now that most of the photos I’ve taken in the past few months didn’t upload properly to my computer from my iPhone…leaving me with some “unreadable” images. My tech lack-there-of savvyness has no clue how to get them to show. Anyone really good at this stuff? Please let me know! I am getting an error message that says “item “IMG_8042.JPG” is used by OS X and can’t be opened” bleh! Sorry to woe you with me blogging hardships but this is a disaster for a photo lover like myself. So with what I have salvaged, please enjoy the photos from our summer thus far, I wish I had them all to show you!

We left our home in Lower Michigan on July 2nd, with an attempt to beat the traffic that would ensue due to the holiday weekend. Our car died on the side of the highway en-route, after one hour on the freeway for no reason at all – or one we and nobody else can figure out. But for the most part the drive was great, we met some backed up traffic on the Mackinac Bridge, and then it was smooth sailing after that!

Once we arrived at camp in Michigan’s Northern half, the Upper Peninsula, we enjoyed the lake life. My dad, brother and Dusty took time to blow up this amazing “floating island” as we called it, and enjoyed the sun and lounging in the water.

Reo really came out of his shell at camp. He had a new found confidence we haven’t seen before. He ran, played, was brave in the woods by himself, and even sat in my lap while I went for numerous kayak trips – he would gladly wade in the water up to where I was parked in the kayak and jump right in. Dusty and I were surprised! He is usually a little more timid and easily scared…we were beyond excited that he rose to “camp dog” in such a quick time.

My view every morning/day/evening while at camp…simply heaven. My happy place. I’d gladly become a hermit and live there all year long if my life allowed it.

While there, Dusty and I enjoyed a sunset on Brockway Mountain, a beautiful and serene viewing area that overlooks Lake Superior. Every evening during the warm weather months, the sun dips down over the horizon and seems to melt its way in to the lake… ahhhhhhhhh

While home Dusty and I enjoyed visiting other nearby places to see friend and family. As mentioned prior, I attended my 10 year high school reunion at the end of July, we had a family reunion around the 4th and all in all our time up north was invaluable. Aside from seeing friends and family, time by the bonfire in the evenings after things had calmed down were much savored. One of my favorite things at camp is to sit in front of the fire and roast a marshmallow or wait until it gets dark enough that the starts come out and fill the sky so vibrantly and you swear you are in a dream…

After spending time in Northern Michigan we then visited Duluth, MN to spend time with Dusty’s family. Lake Superior stretches all the way to MN so being next to the lake even after a 4 hour car ride was wonderful. We made sure to suck up as much time as we could with water nearby.

I had more photos I wanted to show you of the rest of our trip –  but now they’ve been sucked in to never-never-land…I will end with this lovely photo of Dusty and I on our 4th wedding anniversary on July 30. <3

Hope you summer is going swell!